A Different End
by Quinton Notwen
Summary: This is an AU ending for Time of the Doctor, largely the last scenes. Conceived as a One-shot re-do, but may press on in some other way with it.
1. A Different End

**A Different End**

888

"There you go boys…my last secret squeezed out of me…" He said as he leaned against the wall, the crack glowing with an impossible light. "That's my name, no lies to be had here…"

"DOCTOR! YOU WILL FACE US!" The Dalek over the loud speaker roared.

"I thought you said you had a plan!" Clara shouted as she looked at him.

"I did, this is it." The old man said looking back weakly, with his fade blue eyes. "I can't protect these people forever, Clara, I am dying. As we speak my body is dying, and the Daleks will burn this world, one way or another and there's no one else to stop them. I have only one option left, the worst option in the universe, but it's the only one left. The only chance anyone has is if the Time Lords return, and destroy the Daleks."

"But Tasha said the war nearly…"

"Yes, I don't do this lightly." The old man staggered to his feet, bracing on his walking stick. "I can only hope that near destruction has taught them a lesson on how to treat the rest of the universe…"

"DOCTOR! IF YOU DO NOT FACE US WE WILL IGNITE THIS PLANET'S ATMOSPHERE!" the Dalek screamed.

"Fine…" The old man growled as he staggered forward. "Trouble with Daleks is that they take forever to say anything. I may die before they explain how they intend to execute me."

He took another wavering step forward, turned to Clara. "Stay here."

"But…"

"Stay…give me one last victory, hmm? Give me this…plea…"

The crack slammed shut. The old man turned his head slowly and looked at the now undesecrated wall. The light had disappeared completely. There was a loud cracking outside. Flashes of light, the whole of the clock tower shook the bell struck chaotically as bits of dust and building rained down on the old man and Clara. He instinctively grabbed Clara shielding her from the debris.

"ALERT ALERT TEMPORAL RIFT DETECTED! IT IS THE AAAARRRRRGGGHHHH!" Whatever it was that the Daleks were being alerted to silenced them. Explosions thundered.

"Is that them!?" Clara asked looking up at the old man.

He simply looked at her morosely. A slow nod from him was all that was needed to know the truth of what he felt inside his ancient hearts. Clara pulled away from him and turned to run outside, but the old man's weathered, leathery hand clasped hers, holding her with a strength she did not think possible.

"Stay here…"

That's when the wall in the back of the basement ripped open. Light roared forth from it like water through the breach of a dam. The old man stiffened and weakly clutched the lapels of his over-coat doing his best to straighten himself as he turned to it.

"At last, Doctor, finally we are free of our prison!" the voice shouted, almost merry in its tone. A shadow formed out of the light. The shadow quickly solidified stabilizing in the form of flowing red robes hanging on the frame of a thin, middle-aged man. His face sharp with angle cheek bones, his hair thinning but clearly red, his face adorned with an orangey Van Dyke beard and moustache. His eyes were a glacial blue. In his left hand was a scepter, and hung around his neck a golden sash, and clipped the chest of his robes a seal with an emblem Clara had seen multiple times in the TARDIS. The man strode forward smiling at the old man. The smile then faded and an orange eyebrow ticked upwards. "Oh, Doctor, why so glum? You've been coming to this your entire life; wanting absolution, the man to save the Time Lords from himself…you should be ecstatic!"

"It had to be you, didn't it?" The old man said, smirking in derision. "I should've guessed. The only one out there madder than old Rassilon himself. Shoulda known Time Lords jump from one madman to another…"

"Well, I remember you were elected to the position as well, so there is some truth to that madman talk!" the newcomer said with a smile as he walked towards the old man and then past him. He looked to Clara. "I see you haven't lost your eye for pretty, young Earth girls…she gives Jo Grant a bit of a run for her money don't you think? She may even give Ms. Perpugilliam Brown a run for her money…"

"What have you done with the rest of them? Where is Gallifrey? I suspect you ate them all, hmm? That was your thing wasn't it the last time I saw you, trying to stabilizing that festering corpse you called a body…" the old man growled, not turning to look at the newcomer.

"No need…let's say I got the supply at the source." The newcomer chuckled as he circled the old man.

"Ah…so you ate him all up, bones and all…clever…eat an immortal thing and you gain immortality…very primal…very you, I suspect." The old man said still not looking at the newcomer. "I still can't see the others accepting you as their Lord President, yeah the Time Lords like having a madman rule them periodically, and many of the powerful ones become insane, but not you, they'd never accept you."

"And why not?" The newcomer stopped and turned and got into the old man's face, glaring at him with those frozen eyes. "I led them through the shadow lands. I gave them hope when all you gave them was a prison in the penumbra of reality. We had to cannibalize…"

"HA!" The old man snorted involuntarily, looking back at Clara with a pivot of his cane and a smirking glint in his eye.

"..our own timescape to keep us from freezing so we could rebuild our power! Make ourselves ready for our return! And even then…we had to wait centuries, millennia for you to finally get around to saving us…you coward!" The newcomer growled, his mouth contorted into a sneer of utter contempt. "I made us ready! I was the one that paved the way for our ascent into the waking universe. You…you just dithered, as you always do, too afraid of home and hearth to save your own kith…too busy with these mongrel little apes of yours."

"I had to be sure." The old man said. "The universe was here, every major civilized species in the cosmos was here, and petrified of that signal you sent. Everyone agreed at least in practicality with the Daleks that you should not return. They were ready to burn this planet and everything on it, to stop the Time Lords…the Time War from returning, the only ones that protected you were the so-called mongrel apes you detest so much. You should be gra-" The old man tensed and grabbed his chest. His other hand gripped his walking stick as he leaned forward. He groaned.

"Oh, dear, we have been getting a little long in the tooth haven't we?" The newcomer said with a smirk. "Then regenerate…go on then…I'll wait."

"I…can't…" The old man gritted through his teeth.

"Ah, I see…" A gleam shimmered in the newcomer's eyes. "Burnt through all your lives didn't you? I know how that feels. Makes me feel nostalgic for the old days…"

"Feh, you know nothing, you ran from it all your existence. You killed people, raped other races, destroyed planets to avoid it. I at least am ready and willing to accept it…I don't have to like it, but I'm not going to pillage the universe just to tack a few more decades on." The old man gurgled as his knees buckled underneath him.

"Doctor!" Clara moved to run forward but the newcomer put himself between her and him and raised his staff, blocking her.

"Stay back girl…there's nothing you can do now." The man said and he turned to the old man.

"So, Doctor, tell me, how does it feel? Hmm? To feel the wick burning out? That slow simmer into oblivion?" The newcomer asked, kneeling next to the old man.

"If you're going to kill me, kill me, if you're going to leave me for dead, then do that too, don't gloat, I can't stand you gloating….that smug, snaky grin you get…bah…" the old man growled his face contorted in pain, his arm cramping as he tried to stand back up.

"No, no, no, it isn't fair to you, Doctor, on the cusp of your great victory against yourself, Gallifrey restored, the Daleks defeated, you can't just die. Where'd the fun in that be, hmm?" The newcomer swept around to the front of the old man and looked him deep in the eyes. "I should say where would the fun be for me? A universe without the Doctor, it's not worth considering, not yet anyways."

"Nothing you can do...I'll die listening to you talk." The Doctor chuckled to himself. "Clara, that's the problem with Time Lords, they take forever to say anything…probably die of old age before he gets around to killing me."

"Oh, Doctor, you are being naïve." The newcomer said smirking as he raised his hands to the old man's temples. "I told you, I got the supply from the source; I meant the whole kit and caboodle." The newcomer's hands glowed with a fiery orange light. "I burned through a hundred regenerations in a month before settling on this one…."

The newcomer pressed on the old man's temples and the old man gasped in shock as he was covered in orange light. The old man fell backwards and landed at Clara's feet she dropped down and knelt next to him and when she turned his head it was him, when he was young when she met him at the front door of the home she was nannying at.

"What did you do to him!?" Clara demanded looking up at the newcomer.

"He gave me new regenerations…" The Doctor groaned his face started to glow orange. He winced and the glowing faded.

"Oh don't be that guy, Doctor." The newcomer said as he walked up to the Doctor. "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth and give it up."

"You're only doing this to extend some game, I won't play your games!" the Doctor growled pushing himself up to his feet. He jerked backwards as if someone had punched him in the stomach. "I won't…"

"You will though, because you know what this all means." The newcomer said. "And you can't bear to see it happen this way. The Time Lords, ruled by me, back in the universe. Oh, it'll burn in your head you couldn't possibly allow it to happen. No, you'll try some trick or devise some plan, knock together a ragtag group of misfits and ignored underperformers and cultivate them into a force to shake everything I built to the core. Except this time," He tapped his head with a smile, "…the drumming's gone." He smirked and sang in a not quite appropriate voice. "I can see clearly now, the rain is gone….I can see all obstacles in my way…"

"You're still mad though, and I'm not the man I used to be…" The Doctor growled.

"Ha, you won't be the man you are for very much longer, any minute now, he's a comin'," The newcomer said with a smile on his cold, thin lips.

"Who's coming?" Clara asked looking quizzically at the Doctor.

"The Doctor…" The newcomer said, as he looked at the Doctor. "Oh, he's trying ever so hard to cling to himself, can't you see it little human? He's fighting it every step of the way." The newcomer smiled and walked up to the Doctor and leaned into his ear. "But I wouldn't if I were you. You see, Gallifrey is emerging as we speak. A Time Lord armada ten billion strong is materializing in the region of the inner temporum. What Daleks are left will be routed in the first day…and in the second day…"

"A new Time Lord empire…." The Doctor winced, clutching his coat together as if he was trying to contain a bomb.

"Top of the class." The newcomer said. "Now for extra points, who do you think is going to be number one most wanted?"

The Doctor didn't respond, he simply glared forward, and then gave Clara a side-long glance and pursed his lips. Clara knitted her eyebrows. The Doctor took a deep breath. "Me, Clara, I'll be the first one they hunt down…"

"But…he just saved you from destruction, risked his life protecting you." Clara said looking back and forth at the two men.

"Saved us from destruction instigated by himself, he may not have called himself the Doctor…but it was still him." The newcomer said, stepping back, pointing at the Doctor. "And he didn't risk his life to protect us, he risked his life to keep us in the dark…he finally came around to calling us for help because he couldn't muster the juice anymore. If he could've kept us in that little pocket dimension he created, and saved the people of this planet, he most certainly would, wouldn't you have, Doctor?" The Doctor didn't reply, and the newcomer looked to Clara. "Clara, is that your name, you see the Doctor isn't what you'd call a home body, and despite what he may tell you, let's just say he and the Time Lords have a sort of maligned tolerance of one another. That is to say, the Time Lords more often than not have tried to arrest the Doctor for flaunting all of their laws with his TARDIS use, and the Doctor has tolerated it by hiding from them for a very long stretches of time…" The newcomer smirked, "and I see no reason to end that cycle at least for now. I'm going to give you a head start, Doctor. I'm going to let you get into your TARDIS and fly away, and then I'm coming for you, and your little Clara-bell, too! So I suggest you start…"

The Doctor grimaced as he looked to Clara and then to the newcomer.

"Doctor, you aren't moving…" The newcomer lifted the scepter and it glowed with a bright blue, before a burst of electricity fired striking the floor between Clara and the Doctor. "I SAID RUN!"

"Go…go to the TARDIS…" The Doctor said turning, sloppily pushing the TARDIS key into Clara's hand. "I can't control my hands very well, you need to go and unlock the TARDIS for me…"

"But…"

"GO!" The Doctor roared at Clara with a primal rage, and she fled. The Doctor turned to the other man. "I don't care what you do to the rest of the universe, but you leave my friends alone. You hear me?"

"Is that a threat? Brave, from where you're standing." The other man said with a beguiling smile. "Those new regenerations have given you a flare. This will be most fun…the final great chase across the universe. I can't hardly wait to see what you try next…I can see the gears turning…but time's running out. He's right there on the edge…I can smell him, the new Doctor."

Then the man started to cackle as he turned and walked towards the shining gash in the basement wall. It echoed as he faded into the light. It was a deep haughty laugh, the kind of laugh that could only be gotten away with by western fairyland witches, maniacal pulp movie science fiction villains and on occasion vice principals. The Doctor staggered backwards struggling with every step to hold his body together before the big one. The townspeople circled around him and he screamed at them to hide in their homes, shouting in a way that they had never heard him do before, even during the worst of the 900 years war he never screamed with such primal fear and they heeded it and fled.

He could feel his face burning, and could see the flares of orange around his peripheral vision and flowing from his hands. It was now in the emptied streets, he couldn't hold it anymore, no time for memory lane, no time for rewinds, no time for a victory tour. He whipped his arms back and his head up and released it all. The town shook; the hillsides experienced avalanches and the clouds overhead were swept away. He stumbled forward after it was done. A puddle in the war-rutted street revealed his new face, older, grayer, tougher looking, still not ginger. Colors were vivid and new, as were his kidneys. Not a time for speeches, his mind was filled with terror and nightmare things as he half sprinted, half staggered towards the TARDIS. The door was slightly open and he barreled into it.

"Who are…?"

"Not now…" He said; his mind filled with a billion questions he didn't need more from someone else. He searched the console, he knew the console. Red button, blue button, green switch, turn the dial, and…there was something else…something important, purple fiddly bits? Large depressor switch? He knew he knew this, he just couldn't seem to convince his brain that he did.

He looked up at the girl, he wasn't sure who she was, then again he wasn't entirely sure who he was. She had to know she'd been here longer than he had. "How do you fly this thing again?"

"The…TARDIS…"

"Yes, yes…oh what difference does it make; I'm just going to smack the shuffle setting anyways!" He said as he clenched his fist and hit a big button next to a screen with a bunch of crisscrossing arrows on its face.

"Wait, shuffle setting? I have to go to work tomorrow?" Clara shouted.

"HA! Work? You're not going home! I don't even know where we're going!" He giggled and laughed as the TARDIS jerked out from underneath them. He stopped laughing and looked at Clara mournfully. "We may never see Earth again."

Then he burst out in giggles as the TARDIS console sparked and they were both flung towards the railings.

"What are you doing!?" screamed as she clung to the railings.

"Crashing…probably…can't remember how to fly this thing! HAHA!" He guffawed as the TARDIS did another tumble as it tore randomly through the vortex….

In the distance the vast new monstrosity of the Time Lord military popped into existence. The planet of the Time Lords, Gallifrey, dragged into position in orbit of its twin stars. In the rebuilt citadel of the Time Lords, on the throne of the High President, the Master sat, surveying the universe below. A Time Lord in all the regal frills and robes strode towards the throne.

"We've lost him, sir, the TARDIS you're searching for has totally disappeared into the vortex. Its movements were too erratic to track. I'm sorry, my lord." The Time Lord said bowing before the throne.

"That's fine…let him go for now." The Master said looking at the sky depicted above him with glacial blue eyes. The orange Van Dyke twitched upwards as a snaky smile played across his lips. "Prepare, for launch, target all known Dalek powerbases, simultaneously, in all time frames. I want them destroyed this time. Then we can look for him, he can't stay hidden for long, he'll show up, just give it some time…."

The Master's grin became wider and soon it broke into laughter. A broad mad maniacal laughter, but one clear of thought, without the incessant sounds in his head. He was a Master truly reborn and better than before. If the Doctor thought he could trifle with him, he had another thought coming….

**888**

**Yes, I know, I'm not Moffat and it's not as endearing and emotional as seeing Pond. But it is A Different End. And yes, it is a bit of a sequel to my chapter in Where I Can, that features a similar 'Time Lord President' rebuilding post-war Gallifrey in the pocket universe….but it isn't just similar. **


	2. He's Not You

**He's Not You**

**888**

The console smoked. Sparks still periodically flashed from on high fizzled downwards and disappeared into the air. Clara sat against the railing staring into the middle distance. The man who had charged into the TARDIS was now fiddling with the console, haphazardly grumbling as he twiddled bits and bobs.

"I think I've got her down!" He said as he fiddled some more and shook his shoulders.

He tugged at his neck and grumbled. The TARDIS lurched slightly and the rotor shifted half a cycle downward before a shuddering 'chachacha' hissed from the bowels of the machine and a loud 'dong' rang out as the ground beneath them bounced up and down.

He looked at the screens. They all were fuzzy with static. He grumbled as he tapped monitors and twirled dials accomplishing nothing, except the odd pop as circuits gave up and burst angrily. He said something huskily under his breath and sucked his finger and then looked at Clara.

"Are you sure you don't know anything about any of this?" He asked his blue eyes sharply searching her for answers.

"The only time I flew this thing…" Clara started and then stopped, she couldn't remember when she flew it. She knew she had. It was a definite memory but it didn't seem to fit anywhere. A small headache was forming deep in her memory the more she prodded at trying to remember flying the TARDIS. She shook her head and looked at the new man. "He always drove."

"He? Who's he?" The new man asked sharply, his intense blue eyes cutting at her. He fingered the tie snug against his neck and yanked at it pulling it loose and throwing it to the floor.

"You…when you were…someone else." Clara said, looking away from him, to the bow tie the new man had tore off his neck and discarded on the floor. She felt a lump forming in her throat. "You remember don't you? You remember being him right? You remember the Doctor…"

"Oh what are you babbling about? Of course I remember…the…Doctor." He looked quizzically in the distance, closed his eyes and shook his head. The man grumbled and looked to the console. He fidgeted and shifted his shoulders. "I can't think in these clothes!"

He quickly shrugged off the lavender jacket and the tweedy vest and reached for the braces.

"WAIT!" Clara shouted and grabbed his arms. "I've seen you naked once in a different body, I don't really think it's something I want to repeat in a new one…"

"Yes, quite." The man said sizing her up with a curmudgeonly scowl. "I can understand. I'll be back in a minute…I hope."

He turned and walked out of the console room through a large archway that Clara wasn't entirely sure was there a few minutes ago.

She leaned against the TARDIS console. "I know this shouldn't be so…disorienting. I've seen his other faces, I know he changes but this…." She looked towards the archway that very likely hadn't been there before, "this is far more than I expected. I just wish….I wish I had a chance to say…"

"Hello? Helloooo!?" There was a voice, it was his voice. The Doctor's voice, not the man that was currently in the TARDIS but the Doctor's real voice. The voice she knew as the Doctor. She spun around.

"Oh…this…this isn't…" Clara stared at the young man, in browny-green tweed a red bow-tie and a light blue shirt. His hair quaffed to impossible quaffiness. "It's you!"

The man looked at the woman with mild surprise. "It is me…and it's…you?" The man looked surprised and walked around Clara. "Is it not supposed to be me? Clara…are you who you are? Not some Zygon infiltrator waiting for his commander who's disguised as me are you?"

"No, it's just…how can you be here?" Clara asked her eyes inspecting him for fakeness. "I just saw…"

He put his finger on her lips. "No, don't say another word. I don't want to know, I'm guessing this is the future…" He looked around the console. "Looks a bit explody…can't say I like it…" He looked to Clara. "Something's wrong though….something about me…you were surprised it was me…oh…no not that it was me…that it was _me_….very intriguing..."

"But how…"

"Oh the TARDIS is a bit omni-temporal…the TARDIS is also very sentimental noted your distress via the telepathic circuits and created a localized temporal phase synchronization…to bring me to you to comfort you." The Doctor said as he peered at the scanners. He looked to Clara. She was scratching the back of her head with a quizzical look on her face. He smiled to himself. "Or…you know…you wished really, really hard and poof…here I am…"

"But you can't be here…" She said in a whisper. She nodded towards the archway. "He could be back any minute…"

"TARDIS would never allow that." The Doctor said quickly as he stood straight up.

"Who are you talking to!?" shouted the other man's voice from the archway. Footsteps were coming closer and a shadow formed on the far wall.

The Doctor ducked down below the console and looked to Clara apologetically.

"No…one…just myself…mostly…the TARDIS a little…" Clara said sheepishly as the other man poked his head around the corner. He was in a large sequined jacket that would make the rhinestone cowboy look conservative. Clara looked incredulously at the man. "You're not…thinking that are you?"

"Why not…Elton John gave it to me…it's a favorite…" the man said with a stern look.

"It's just a bit…attention grabbing…" Clara said, biting her lip against the giggle.

The man looked down, frowned slightly and then looked back up to her. "Yes, I can see that…says shoot me now, Dalek, doesn't it? Not very good for slinking about dark corridors…Right…back to it then!"

He disappeared back down the corridor and Clara looked at the Doctor wide eyed and then started to laugh. The Doctor jumped up and looked at her sternly.

"Oi, this is a very…sensitive time…brain's all a mess, synapses re-wiring…body's still not…quite the right size…" The Doctor looked back to the corridor, and squirmed slightly in his tweed jacket. "Plus…I've seen worse…worn worse…"

Clara reached up and straightened his bow tie. "I know…"

"Hey, you should've seen me half a dozen regenerations back…patchwork quilt….and a cat pin…that's all to be said…" The Doctor said leaning against the console and crossing his arms over his chest. "The Rhinestone Cowboy could do far worse…trust me…I had quite the fetish with question marks as well when I got middle aged. Don't let me wear things with question marks…I looked meta…"

"Won't this…screw things up?" Clara asked, leaning next to the console with the Doctor. "I mean you know now…you know you don't…."

"Shhh…" The Doctor hushed quickly. "Yes and no…the less I know the better. I doubt my memories will survive the time differential when the TARDIS puts me back in my own time stream. You're brain Swiss cheeses a bit if you meet yourself out of sequence…the past tends to forget the encounter with the future self…universe's way of working out the paradoxes. But the more I encounter the more likely I will remember something critical…best play it safe, no spoilers."

"It's just…he's not you." Clara said she reached over and grasped the Doctor's hand.

"Of course he is." The Doctor said, looking at Clara. "He's the Doctor."

"But you're the Doctor."

"Yes, I am he and he is me." The Doctor replied quietly. He chuckled quietly to himself. "And we are all together coo coo cachoo." He looked to Clara. "He may not act it, but he's terribly frightened. This process…especially now…is frightening. It's painful and you lose yourself for a while. He'll need you far more now, than I ever did. You have to be his anchor in the storm."

"He doesn't even know who I am? He doesn't know how to fly the TARDIS…."

"Clara…" The Doctor said sternly but gently. "Give it time, time mends everything, eventually."

"Doctor?"

"Yes?"

"Could you take me home?" Clara asked looking in the Doctor's eyes. "Please?"

"Clara…" The Doctor's eyes wore the sadness of the question, the disappointment.

"I just…" She looked back to the archway and then to the Doctor.

"No, Clara, I can't…I shouldn't even be here interacting with the TARDIS, getting her to move…is dangerous. It could destabilize the synchronization, blow a hole in the universe the size of…of…of Belgium!" the Doctor said pushing away from the console and spinning and looking at Clara.

"Belgium? That's a bit…"

"Anticlimatic…yes, I know." The Doctor said. He slid in close to Clara and held her hands with his. "Clara, I know this is difficult, trust me I know. But I need you to do this for me, I need you to help me with this. It's uncharted territory from here on out…you're the first face that face will see, you're my only friend in the universe right now, the only person I know. I need you to help me through this. I promise you, this will get better, but you need to promise me to wait out the storm be there for me in my time of greatest need, when I'm the most vulnerable. Do this for me? One last request? Please? Save my life one more time…"

Clara nodded quietly and sniffed sadly. "I'll miss you, you know."

"Shh, shh…" The Doctor came in and hugged Clara tightly as she started to cry. "I know, I know…but I'm not really gone. I'm part of him now, my memories are his memories. I won't ever forget any of it. Do you understand? I won't forget one second of when I was me, and we were together…" He held her at arms' length and smiled at her. "My impossible girl, brave heart, Clara, brave heart..."

The Doctor stood back from Clara and smiled. Clara smiled also and then heard the footsteps. She spun around, looking to the archway.

"Girl! I can clearly hear you talking to someone, who are you nattering with!" The other man shouted as he swept into the console room.

He was wearing a black theater jacket with bright crimson inner lining. A dark lavender vest with a black button down shirt and black pants with a pair of black shoes. He looked fervently around. Clara spun to look for the Doctor only to find he'd disappeared.

"I was…" She was searching for an excuse a reason a logical reason. He was staring at her intent to know what was going on. She bit her lip and took a deep breath. "I was getting some advice from an old friend about how I should proceed." Clara said with a smile.

"And this old friend, are they a ghost? Or just normally invisible?" The man said his gray eyebrows knitting together incredulously.

"You could say that they are a ghost…" Clara said quietly, testing the waters.

The man nodded quietly and proceeded forward. "Be careful which ghosts you speak to in the TARDIS…she's got many. Not all of them are benevolent." He swept up the dais and put his hands on the console and gently stroked it before tsking quietly to himself. "Navigational system's blown. External sensor grid is burnt out. Universal positioning system is in an infinite regression calculation….and external opticals are…" He stopped and looked closer at the monitor, furrowing his brow. "Is that fog?" The man looked at Clara. "Other words I haven't the foggiest idea where we are, nor how to proceed from here. Guess we're doing this the old fashioned way."

"Old fashioned way?" Clara asked quirking an eyebrow.

"Yep, I'll stick my head out the door if it isn't bitten off or burned off or boiled or sucked into a black hole, should be safe." The man said with a nod. "Stay here, Clara, I may need you to extract the rest of me from the gullet of something quite carnivorous."

"You…you know my name…" Clara smiled.

"Don't be daft, of course I know your name, I spent a good chunk of the end of my life trying to figure you out…you don't forget the name of an impossible person very easily, now come along, stay behind me and I'll pop my head out and have a bit of a recky." The Doctor said as he swanned towards the TARDIS doors. "Just make sure you hold on tight…and be ready to pull me in if something hungry is waiting on the other side!"

Clara smiled as she reached around the Doctor's waist. He put his hands on the door, prepared to open them. He gave her a smile, his blue eyes twinkled and he swept the doors open.

**888**

**This is another chunk of the 'Other ending'. I'm not sure how I'm going to proceed. **


	3. The Shaga

**The Shaga**

**888**

"After all landing checks, I can say that it is initially safe outside." The Doctor said as he slipped a broach into the top of his vest pocket and popped a mint into his mouth. He passed Clara a gold broach with a red gem in the center and then a lime colored mint. "Here, clasp that broach on, eat this mint."

"Err…why?" Clara asked as she stared at the two items in her hand.

"To go outside of course." The Doctor said giving her a look that suggested she'd just drooled over herself. He sniffed a loud sniff and tipped his head back and forth as he stretched his neck and turned and walked towards the door. He pulled at his black overcoat and buttoned over himself. He ran his hands through his silvery hair, and pulled the door open. Mist wafted into the TARDIS.

"Is there a reason…why do I have to eat this mint and put on the broach?" Clara asked following him.

"Stop gabbin' and just do it." He grumbled and stepped outside.

Clara looked at the mint and the broach, frowning slightly and then she popped the mint in her mouth. It didn't taste like a mint. It tasted like an aspirin. She clasped the broach onto the red top she was wearing. She straightened out the tartan skirt she was wearing and stepped outside.

Upon exiting the TARDIS the broach's gem glowed and she felt a sharp shock run through her body. She yelped loudly.

"Just the broach reconfiguring the action potential thresholds of your muscles…it'll take a second for the nanites in the mint to fully calibrate." The Doctor said from somewhere in the fog bank.

"Wait, what!?" Clara said. She tried to walk towards the Doctor's voice but her legs were numb and didn't want to move.

"Gravity here is only point six earth normal…if you come swanning out here like normal you'll bounce all over the place." The Doctor's voice explained grumpily. His shadow formed on the fog bank's edge and finally he emerged. "The broach transmits a mild muscle disruption signal to your body adjusts it so that when you walk and move about you do so as if you are moving in Earth normal gravity. Trust me, makes things far easier to manage than if you were walking around as if you were forty percent lighter."

"Why didn't you say that to begin with?"

"Would you have swallowed the mint and put on the broach if I'd said I was putting a machine on and in you that utterly adjusts your body's neuro-muscular systems?" The Doctor replied casually as he looked around into the abyss of fog.

"Well…"

"No, I didn't suspect you would. Come a long, we've gotta find a way out of this fog." The Doctor said as he again disappeared in a wafting stream of clouds.

Clara grumbled and followed, but found that the ground was quite bouncy. The whole of it seems squishy. She noticed that she wasn't walking on grass but on soil but it hadn't been soil long, the main parts of leaves and sticks and other detritus was still readily visible although highly broken down.

"So…" Clara started, her arms crossed over her chest as she picked her way through the fog. "What are we doing here?"

"Trying to find our way out of the fog." The Doctor's voice responded from somewhere slightly to Clara's left. She heard some scraping as he moved through unseen underbrush and then he magically appeared to her right. "As I feared, no magnetosphere, compass is completely useless." He handed her a large compass the size of a hamburger bun. "Nope, nothing for it but to get a good look at the sky and try and coordinate with the astrolabe." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small triangular object attached to a wand. "Digi-labe MegaMark 4000…full catalogue of all pulsars during the Humanian era…all we need is sixteen to achieve a ninety-nine percent position lock. So much better than the old days of trying to do it with paper star charts and Chatterton buggering me in the ear." He furrowed his eyes. "There's something wrong about this though…" He sniffed rather deeply, and his sparkling blue eyes cut around into the murk of the fog. "Yes, yes…something not quite right." His lips pursed for a second and then it was gone. "Whatever it was it'll pop up sooner or later, onwards…I think the ground inclines this way…towards the…well…huh…this direction in front of us." He then proceeded to walk away fading into the mist.

"Why can't we just, you know, take the TARDIS up…?" Clara asked, hopefully as she tried to find a place to stick the enormous compass the Doctor handed her.

"Take the TARDIS UP!?" The Doctor said sharply, his face quickly reappearing from the gloom. He grabbed the compass from her and he slipped it seamlessly into his coat. "Without knowing where we are!? Dangerous, none of the navigation systems are functional. I'll need a reference point before the TARDIS goes anywhere." He turned and started to walk away again his voice still filtering through the mist. "Take the TARDIS up…hmph. We could end up in the heart of a star just going willy-nilly like that. Acts like I'm some kind of taxi service…"

Clara frowned and continued to follow the Doctor in the mist as the ground below her continued to slightly slope upwards. He was definitely more abrasive now, and far less impressed with her. Although she had to admit she had become a bit comfortable with the idea of going home after each adventure, and at least from what she'd seen those times were over. She wondered and she reached into the pocket of her blouse and produced a cellphone.

"I'll be having that!" The Doctor said, appearing from the fog this time from her right. He snatched the phone from her and pulled his sonic screwdriver out of his pocket, pointing it at the phone. The screwdriver whirred to life and the phone exploded lightly in his hand as sparks shot everywhere.

"HEY!" Clara shouted as she grabbed for the phone, but the Doctor deftly avoided her grasp and then chucked the phone into the foggy distance.

"No phones…they're listening for us." The Doctor said lifting the screwdriver to his lips in a shushing motion and then pocketing it. "They could track any phone call through the vortex…"

"How am I supposed to call the school, and tell them I'm…" Clara tried to find a word that was apt, "on extended leave?"

"That my dear isn't your biggest problem." The Doctor said as he looked around.

"And what's my biggest problem?" Clara said mostly indignantly.

"Something's following us…" The Doctor whispered quietly as he fervently looked around. He took another deep breath through his nose. "I knew something wasn't right…"

"What kind of something?" Clara whispered.

"The worst kind of something…" The Doctor whispered, lowering his voice again.

"And that is?"

"The unknown something…" The Doctor hissed quietly, he gently but firmly locked arms with Clara. "Let's keep moving, don't run…just keep moving."

They walked closely together for what seemed like a perilous eternity before the Doctor finally released Clara and told her quietly to stay put. He dipped back into the mist and left her encircled by gray shifting nothing in all directions. She stood for several minutes, crossing and uncrossing her arms, half in frustration with the Doctor and half because she didn't know what else to do. After standing for several minutes she prodded with her foot into the surrounding depths of nothing, finally her foot hit something solid. Clara then reached forward with her hands and clutched at the solidness finding to have a very grainy mineral-y feel to it. It was a large boulder of some sort, kind of felt like a bit of coral or something but she found it was large enough for her to at least sit on, which she then did.

There was something about the fog. It was so silent. It was quite obvious from what she had seen through the murkiness that they were in some kind of forest, lots of fronds and big leaves, like something out of one of those travel guides to Costa Rica or Brazil. The thing was it was silent. It wasn't dark out and there wasn't any poor weather but there were no any animal sounds. No howls, no grunts, no whinnies, no birds singing, no insects buzzing, no frogs ribbitting, nothing it was simply silent. She didn't even hear the Doctor scrambling about in the underbrush.

It gave one the intense feeling something very unpleasant was going to happen very soon at any moment, without warning. Clara felt quite uneasy. She figured this must have been what the zebras felt like just before the lions busted out of the tall grass. She rubbed her shoulders as much for warmth as for comfort as she tried to peer out into the constantly shifting morass of half-condensed water vapor. That's when it happened.

The entire understory in front of her exploded into life. Clara screamed loudly, startled as the man-shaped object vaulted into her fog bubble. It was slender, thin with long arms, long legs, and a round head. The skin was fleshy, like a frog's skin. Large eyes looked at her in terror. Its mouth gaped showing off a yellow lining. Its fingers were long and ended in little bulbs of flesh. As Clara came down from her start, she could see that the skin was blotchy black and green in color but it shifted as the creature stood stock still staring at her. A small brown tunic was draped around its frame.

"Umm…" Clara gulped, mustering courage. "Hiya."

"What are you doing out here!? Who are you!?" the creature shouted, a high fluty shout.

"Umm…my friend and I are trying to get out of the fog…" Clara gulped, not sure where the conversation was going.

"You should be hiding!" The froggy person said, as it looked back and forth. "The Shaga is coming!"

"The what…?"

Then as if to answer the question there came an ominous hissing and then something chittered from beyond the veils of fog. The newcomer spun around, its thin muscles tensing against its frame.

"It's found me…it's coming!" the newcomer said and turned to flee. It stopped and looked at Clara. "We must hide!"

"I'm not going anywhere without the Doctor!" Clara said backing away.

"There isn't time for this…medicine man to show up!" The frog-person said as he reached out and grabbed her.

"No! DOCTOR!" Clara shouted yanking herself free of the newcomer.

"Be quiet!" The newcomer hissed, looking around. "The Shaga will hear you!"

"What is the Shaga!?" Clara hissed in return, having a guess that it wasn't a puppy or a kitten.

"It is the Shaga!" the newcomer replied, completely baffled by the question. "We must hide lest it find us!"

"I'm not going anywhere…." Clara started, and then the fog shifted, swirled and she saw it for the first time.

It was huge, the size of a small lorry at least. The legs were stubby but numerous on a large caterpillar-like body, a huge pair of antennae swept in all directions in front of it. It seemed very fleshy, almost fuzzy, and may have been slightly comical for a monster if it were for what else Clara saw. Towards the front of it, which Clara assumed was the front, was a small port, and even in the gloom she could see the glistening of twisting, sharp slicing mouth parts that scythed against one another making a chittering noise as each bladed mouth part blurred against its neighbor giving the impression of a spinning tube of saws inside the mouth.


	4. Sky Gods

**Sky Gods**

**888**

"NO! Your fight is with me demon!" the frog man leapt at Clara and pushed her aside as the giant, squishy centipede shot a viscous fluid forward. The man was plastered to a log, as Clara was knocked aside.

The creature chittered and its antennae waved about excitedly. It dropped down onto its legs and quickly marched forwards. Clara could hear the mouthparts scything back and forth against each other as it scurried forward on its stubby, fleshy legs. Clara looked around her hands searching for something anything that could be construed as a weapon, a rock, a stick, anything. The ground was soft, fleshy, covered in moss, but even underneath the moss it felt very mutable. She could feel the tremors of the Shaga as it tapped the mucous it had ejected at the frog person. The tremors were getting bigger, the Shaga chittered again and its antennae flitted upwards, and then she heard the scream.

She looked up, the mists shrouded everything within fifty meters, but the scream was primal like on an old Tarzan movie. Finally the shadow, quickly followed by the image of the Doctor swooped into view from on high, his waist coat flapping scarlet and black as he dropped in on a vine. One hand was grabbing tightly onto the large liana, the other holding a large wooden stick, sharpened on the end. Within seconds the creature was chittering a bellowing scream. The Doctor was crashing to the ground, bouncing as he hit the soil, and backpedalling as the beast thrashed.

Clara looked up. The stick was jammed solidly into one of the tiny eyes on the top of the creatures head, it gushed a sickly, viscous, greenish-blue fluid. It reared, waving its laughably stubby legs, only now large fang-like scythes revealed themselves from the plush legs. It then curled and dove into the mists, its chittering screams and scowls echoing in the forest.

"Took you long enough!" Clara shouted, with adrenaline fueled anger. "You left me here! I could've been eaten alive by that…that…"

"Massive Onychophoran…" The Doctor said looking into the mists that the creature disappeared into. "Absolutely enormous…" He turned and looked at the frog person. "Oh, hello, nice to meet one of the locals finally!"

He walked forward and extended one of his hands. The frog person simply looked up at him in bewilderment, he struggled slightly but the goop he was in held him fast against the log it had plastered him against. The Doctor smiled gleefully for a few minutes before noticing the issue at hand.

"Clara, I did tell you to stay put…" The Doctor said.

"I did stay put, except to find someplace to sit." Clara grumbled, walking up to him. "You left me…and then he showed up…and then that thing…"

"Yes, but I found out some very interesting things." The Doctor said as he hopped gently up and down. He took out his sonic screwdriver. "Firstly, this isn't ground we're walking on…" He pointed the screwdriver at the frog-man in the mucous. He looked back at Clara as the screwdriver whirred. "Oh, Peri, would've loved this….it's a giant tree! This whole area is on the limb of a truly ENORMOUS TREE! It's gotta be the size of a country…the tree itself has to be…I don't know the size of Asia! That or the dimensional functions of the TARDIS have gone all whackadoodle again and we're very, very tiny…but that wouldn't explain our friend here." He looked to the frog man and then to the screwdriver. "Ah, fast solidifying adhesive…it really was just an enormous velvet worm…you know I think it might be ill-conceived to pitch out my 'we're really just tiny' hypothesis…"

"DOCTOR!" Clara shouted.

"Yes, I'm sorry, Clara…" The Doctor said as he knelt in front of the mucous and knocked on it with his knuckles. It was indeed very solid now. "Should've come right away…but I had to whittle a sharpened point on a stick…you weren't expecting me to fight that thing with just the sonic screwdriver were you?"

"Well…" Clara frowned and lifted her hand to her mouth and chewed on one of her nails. "No…."

"Hmm…the fluid is a liquid…and then after the protein denatures it creates a rigid crystal lattice." The Doctor murmured as he poked the mucous with his finger, and then licked his finger. "Based upon a lignin-glutinase….if my taste buds are still functioning…rather easy to deal with, find the right resonance…we'll have you out of there quick as you please…Mister…ah…Missus…ah…do you have a gender…or preferably a name."

"Yuta…" The frog person said still a bit perplexed as he looked to the man and then to Clara.

"Well, Yuta, after we free you, you can lead us back to your village or your hut…or whatever. Maybe show us to a free patch of sky…" The Doctor said as he pointed the screwdriver at the mucous, whirring it at different pitches.

"Then…you are sky gods then…" Yuta the frog person said, his eyes opened wide as he looked at the two of them.

"Ah, there it is!" The Doctor said as he fiddled with the screwdriver. He looked to Yuta. "This may be slightly discomforting for a minute…just hold still."

He then turned the screwdriver on full power. Within seconds the mucus cracked and in another couple of seconds it was sheathing off of Yuta. Yuta pulled himself free from the remaining bits of solidified velvet worm mucous and instantly dropped to his knees and put his head to the 'ground'.

"Oh, thank you, Sky God….thank you for being benevolent when we have sinned so much…please…tell me…that we are free of your…"

"Oh you can stop with that!" The Doctor said frowning, and jamming his screwdriver into his jacket pocket. He got down and pulled Yuta to his feet. "I'm not a god, sky or otherwise…and Clara…she most definitely isn't."

"Hey!"

"Clara!" The Doctor warned with a glare. He looked back to Yuta ,and Yuta slumped to his knees in surprise. "If anything we're more lost here than you…and we need to get a look at the stars to find our way home. Do you have a village? Or somewhere out of the fog?"

"A village…yes…" Yuta said, but he frowned and looked away. "But I must never return. I was meant to search for the Shaga to end its terror, and end the Sky God's curse on our lands."

"I see…" The Doctor said, he looked to Clara, then back to Yuta. "These sky gods….they show themselves to you? They look like us, possibly?"

"No, not like you…they were much smaller." Yuta said. "They came about five harvests ago…said they wanted us to leave this place and go elsewhere, beyond the sky. The Elder at the time, said that this was our ancestral lands, our souls were tethered to this place, that we would not forsake Mother Agama…" Yuta looked to the ground. "The Sky Gods then said that they would cover our lands in mist and fog and bring the demon Shaga to bear upon us…and so it has been for five years now." Yuta looked up at the Doctor and Clara. "I have come…to end the Shaga's hunger and destroy the demon…"

The Doctor looked at the frog person. He didn't say a word, his blue eyes washing over the amphibious young person. A frown was worn upon his lips.

"Yuta…" Clara said. "Why by yourself, where are the rest of your people?"

"My grandfather was the elder who refused the Sky Gods, it is my family's burden to bear. My grandfather went first, with arrows and a fine bow." Yuta said looking to Clara with his large golden eyes. "Before me, my father and brother went with sword and axe into the shades…none of them ever returned." Yuta flexed his muscles and put his long thing fingers against his bare chest. "I vowed to end this curse on our people. I promised that I would end the Shaga terror, to bring the sky lights back! I will do this or die trying…"

"Your grandfather brought arrows and a bow, your brother and father brought a sword and an axe…and you bring…?" The Doctor said looking at the amphibian critically.

"I…I…the elders…said that weapons wouldn't…." Yuta started, flustering but defiant.

"What are you saying, Doctor?" Clara looked to him as his face became stonier.

"You won't end the terror; you'll just be the next course in its meal, Yuta." The Doctor said, narrowing his eyes. "You're a sacrifice, not a slayer. I wish to go to your village, you will lead the way."

"I can't…I made a…"

"A promise to elders who sent you out against…against…" The Doctor, pointed in the direction of a chittering growl, "That thing...unarmed. Sent an unarmed child hell-bent on vengeance for his missing family members out into the fog and the dark to fight something very predatory and very large…and very much sounding far too close for comfort…" The Doctor turned, his anger melting into concern and then realization. "Obvious…really…" He said quietly to himself.

"What is obvious…?" Clara shook her head as she looked where the Doctor was looking.

"On Earth velvet worms are extreme recyclers. Nothing is put to waste." The Doctor said whispering to himself more than speaking to anyone in particular. "If they miss a target or the prey escapes…they eat the mucous that they eject to recoup the metabolic loss…."

"Then that means…" Clara said as she looked into the mist sure she was now seeing shadows in the distance.

"Oh, yes…" The Doctor said, nodding.

"But you injured it…" Clara said, trying to drum up some reassurance.

"Onychophorans have been known to be eusocial…" The Doctor said as he slowly walked backwards towards Yuta. "Yuta, how many Shaga are there?"

"How many?" The frog person asked.

"Yes, man!" The Doctor growled, glaring back at the frog person.

"No one is sure…maybe four…or more." Yuta said looking into the distance as he tried to remember.

"Which way to your village, Yuta?" The Doctor asked hurriedly, kneeling next to frog person.

Yuta pointed. "That way towards Gundar's Cross…if you could see it…"

"Come on then." The Doctor said lifting Yuta up. "You are coming with us."

"I can't…I…"

"You will!" The Doctor said, forcefully his blue eyes flashing. "I want to talk to these elders, and I most certainly wish to speak with these so called Sky Gods!"

"But the Shaga…"

"Will leave us be…it'll be too busy trying to slurp up its slime." The Doctor said hoisting Yuta onto his feet and pushing him forward gently. "As long as we're out of here, it'll completely ignore us…" He looked back at Clara. "Come on, let's go, faster the better…something isn't right here…I knew it when we walked out of the TARDIS….this fog doesn't smell right and I've got a sick feeling I know why!"


End file.
